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1998

EnlightenmentDonald J. HerzogUniversity of Michigan Law School, dherzog@umich.edu

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Recommended CitationHerzog, Donald J. "Enlightenment." Law Quad. Notes 41, no. 2 (1998): 80-3.

The f ollowing e c 1pt is adapt d from Poi oning the Minds of the Lower Orders, by Don Herzog, to b published in August by Princeton Umversity Pres . Publi ation here is by pennis ion.

- BY DoN HERZOG

Its a curious broadside, a work of austere graphics and polite prose far removed from the mischievous engravings and bawdy ballads usually appearing on such sheets. Drawn from an address that 345 printers had signed and 138 had presented to the queen, the original text was committed to parchment "and accompanied by a Copy superbly printed on white Satin, edged with white Silk Fringe , backed with Purple Satin, and mounted in an Ivory Roller with appropriate Devices.' Even in the published version , the arch is full of intricately detailed work. The printers took pride in their craftsmanship: "This Specimen of the Typographic Art," they bragged, "was surrounded by the Border and Ornaments on this Sheet, which alone contain upwards of Twenty-six Thousand moveable Pieces of Metal. " The quantitatively inclined will want to know that it measures 21 5/8 by 15114 inches .

On the top, an arch marked Lords on one end, Commons on the other, supports a crown. So much is unremarkable , a casual reference to very old theories of mixed government: English politics was a balance of monarchy, aristocracy, and democracy But on the bottom, an equally impressive display of filigree work surrounds, of all things, a printing press.

80 THE U IVER ITY OF MICHIGAN LAW CHOOL

The published version reproduces the printers' address to the queen presented on 14 October 1820, and adds her response. (Well , not precisely her response . The queen's English wasn't very good; she couldn't have turned out the impeccably clipped cadences of the published response , and through the tawdry events of 1820 her advisers produced one text after another published in her name.) The printers congratulate the queen on her safe arrival in England and accession to the throne . They describe themselves as ' the humble instruments of that mighty power," the press, "which, in advocating your Majesty's cause, so energetically sustains the declining liberties of England"; they advert ominously to a conspiracy against her; they close vvith a bravado flourish:

In future times, should the page of History record the present era as one in which overwhelming Power combined with Senatorial Venality to crush an unprotected Female, we trust it will also preserve the gratifying remembrance, that the base Conspiracy was defeated by the irresistible force of Public Opinion, directed and displayed through the powerful medium of a Free, Uncorrupted, and Inconuptible Britisl1 Press.

Posterity, even history's page, has no particularly sharp memory of the matter, gratifying or otherwise. As far as it has survived, though, it usually hasn't been framed quite this way.

Whatever her own beliefs about posterity, the queen exhibits a doughty courage in responding. She too embraces public opinion: "It is Public Opinion which has supported me in the otherwise unequal conflict with numerous adversaries, who not only possess unbounded resources, but who have never scrupled any means by which their vengeance could be gratified. This Publi Opinion is the concentrated force of many enlightened minds, operating through the medium of The Press." Not all the press, concedes the queen, serve as the medium of enlightenment. Thanks to the vicious tactics of her nameless adversaries, their tireless efforts to intimidate and corrupt the press, some are "busily employed in fabricating the most atrocious slanders against myself. . . . " But the queen is sanguine, pleasantly surprised that in the face of such tactics, so much of the press has remained honest, smugly confident that "The for e of truth is ultimately irresistible:- but truth, without some adventitious aid , moves with a slow pace, and sometimes its motion is so slow as to be imperceptible - The Press is its accelerating power - The Press gives it wings - The Press does more for truth in

a day, than mere ral teachmg could m a century ''

But why the lionization of the press? v\'ho was th queen? Wh her nefari us enemtes? I don't mean to be coy. The queen as Caroline. Her husband was George IV. finally about to take the throne in 1820 after a pamfully l ng tenure in that trying role of Prin e of \ ales. As prince, George had a nasty habit of running up fabul us gambling debts and turning to Parliament to pay them off. Hundreds of thousands of pounds lat r, George faced an arranged marnag vvith Caroline of BrunsWlck in an attempt to make him properly ettl d. George already was secretly married to a Catholi wid , Mrs. Man Fitzh rb rt. Or s rt of seer tl : rumor had swirl d through London. But Charles j am s Fo -the gr at hig lead r, a ur d Parham nt

that th r as n thing t the 1um r ; and G org marri d r lm in pril 1795.

They didn't 1i. happily e raft r; apparently, ne mght tog ther as enough to disgust th gr m. Unlu l il enough , though , G rge manag d tog L

Car lin- pr gnant. "I shudd r at th v ry th ughts of sitting at th s m t bl " "th her," G rge confid d in n fri nd about a y ar later, 'ore en [ being under th same r [ with h r. n at hing her dan , ne bserver a appall d: "Such an er-dr ss d , bare-bosom d, painted e-br ' ed figure on nev r saw!" Th ugh the p1i n e' fa ther, rg Ill, was her staun h ally, aroline

departed m 1814 for a career of continental tra el - and , or so it seemed to many, of carousing and sexual escapades. She befriended and rapidly promoted one Bartolomeo Bergann to e er more presngious and mtimate positions in her household. Their relauonship scandalized observers.

George III died on 29 January 1 20; Caroline landed m England on 5 june, with every intention f asserting her plac as crowned queen. Eyebrm s were raised, curi sit) pro ked, ppetite for goss1p inflamed: ind fatlgable d1arist Charle Grevill moaned on 25 june that the affair ' a "an intolerable nuisance," m nopohzing nversati n in polite s 1 ty. hat ' as George t do .

r before Berg mi's appearance n th s ene , Georg alread r wa charging Carolin vvith e. ~al infidelities, trying in ain to nd himself f her. "d li at

in e tigati n" m 1806, pur ued behind th s n and k pt fairl quiet, l ared her. Qui t but n t quiet nough:

amlin nd her advisers g t as far a printing, but n t publishing, Th Book , a oll ti n f nfid ntial negotiation

and a us ti ns. Wiit rs learning about the pr dings appr ached George for hu h m ne . 1 13 s a flurry of a tivit - h des f th se n- ar it h- and the appearan of TI1 Book for publi d l ct tion. George as read to mo e m r de isi ely. A green bag, th

ordinary parliamentary device for con eying documents but soon to become infamous in radical circles as a dread symbol of secrecy and corruption revealed to Parliament the case against Caroline. Soon the House of Lords considered a special Bill of Pains and Penalties designed to abrogate the marriage. So ensued what amounted to a trial, beginning 17 August, with lawyers for both sides introducing evidence and interviewing witnesses. Monarchy was on display mall its tattered and seed glory. Legal proceedings on adultery ( crim. con. " short for criminal conversation, in the thinl eiled parlance of the day) had l ng made for popular reading; so too had stories about sexual antics at court. The inter ection of these two genres was sizzling, even exrplosi e. Perhaps the dignit of the House of Lords was threat ned by the endless days of testimony on the particular p sitions of hands, p stures in arriages, bodies gliding silently through dark chambers, stains on bed sheets, and the like testimony that arne for the most part fr m an apparentl disreputable band of foreign ervants. But the nation found the spe tacle enticing e en ri eting. These er issues f moment us onstitutional imp rt. The ere

in scapabl als issues of titillating f lly. The gossip , alread bubbling up before Carolines return to England, mes fast and furious in contemp rary ources.

Carolin(- _ressed like a man! Bergami was a woman! Caroline was actually crazy!

George, who didn't appear himself, had a hard time posing as the innocent w d injured husband, and not only u.rcause he was a bigamist. Portly, even bloated, providing an easy target for hostile cartoonists and pamphleteers, "the dandy of sixty" remained inordinately fond of pretty women and had one intimate affair after another. Ths notorious fact gave Whig lawyer Henry Brougham, the queen's chief advocate -- during the proceedings, an opportunity that he exploited to excruciating effect. Calmly instructing the Lords that he was happy to draw a veil over what had ' . transpired between Caroline's initial '

arrival in 1795 and her departure for the continent in 18 14, Brougham declared airily that the queen's cause "does not require recrimination at present," but he added that later he might need to explore those years. A legal advocate, he continued, must be relentless in pursuing h client's interest: "He must go on reckless of the consequences, if h fate it should unhappily be, to involve his country in confusion for h s client's '

protection!" Insinuated, retracted, and finally pressed forcibly home, the threat ',

was palpable. Should the king approach ( victory l-us own inglorious sexual history would be explored. 4 - *.: , I

George was laboring unaer burderk besides those of dalliance and girth. Memories of his spendthrift days stood in poignant contrast to the burdens of taxation and poverty created by war with France. (I wonder how many knew of his fetching proposal that an L8 million

private coffer, in consideration of my .

exertions & all I have done for the country as well as for the whole wor'ld. Such are my deserts, at least such I feel them to be.") Some, too, thought George's apparent eagerness to assume the regency in the days of his father's madness unseemly So George's enemies found Caroline a convenient weapon; much of the apparently warm affection for her is nothing but poorly disguised hostility to him. "Poor woman," wrote Jane Austen, "I shall support her as long as I can, because she is a Woman, & because I hate her Husband. . . ." ,- ;:_ '

Protagonists be damned, thought some - radicals, relishing the stakes in public discussion of these matters. Leigh Hunt told the poet Shelley that the proceedings would help topple belief in monarchy and provide discussion of "questions of justice respecting the intercourse of the

- 2 - ; .- sexes. " Others were irritated or appalled by

the transparency of the sexual double standard. David bcardo complained, "The question of her innocence or guilt is not the important one, - she has been abominably treated, and no grounds have been, or can be stated, to prove this disgusting enquiry either just, or necessary for the public good." Similarly, Samuel Taylor Coleridge, a decidedly dyspeptic Tory by then, conceded years later, "The People were too manly to consider the Queen was guilty 'Whaf .) , right had the King to complain!' was .- * .- their just argument ." Caroline starred a; darling of the radical press, some of the mainstream press too, in maudlin ; :i celebrations: "History has no example," . ': .' .. gushed one writer, "of a spirit so noble in unmerited suffering, a fortitude so meek and so immovable." Whatever the impact of public opinion, the proceedings didn't go well for George. Witnesses faltered: "Non mi ricordo," one Italian witness's

favorite dodge, became proverbial in English as a way of avoiding saylng somethmg embarrassing. On 10 November 1820, a scant majority of nine votes on the bill's third reading forced the government to withdraw the bill.

A joke limped its way among the nobility: "If anybody asks you why the Queen is like the Bill of Pains and Penalties, you must say because they are both abandoned." In the streets, the crowds were jubilant. In time-honored fashion, all over England, they demanded illumination: home owners could display candles in their windows night, joining the celebration, or risk having their windows broken. Robert Southey, poet laureate and sidekick of Wordsworth and Coleridge, sullenly refused to join one such celebration and was grudgingly relieved to find his windows intact. "Lord, what a stupid monster Jol Bull is," scoffed Walter Scott.

A dour C-~rge withdrew from t h ~ public eye for a couple of months, stewing over what to do with a detested wife neither convicted nor cleared by the parliamentary proceedings. Others had to face the question: Was she going to crowned queen? Fumbling over what title to assign Caroline, the Anti-Jacobin Review retailed some of the salacious details:

Europe, the princess hired a vessel t take her to Asia; and among her suite was Bergami. On board the Polacco many acts of gross indecency are sworn to have taken place. Bergami accompanied her when she was bathing; he was seen kissing her on a '

gun; a tent was erected on the deck of this vessel, which was on various

occasions closed during the day . . . the Queen and Bergami remaining under it; and finally under this tent Bergami and the Princess slept for

Such are a few, and only a few, of the Facts of this case; do they not speak for themselves? Is such a woman fit to

wound its way to England about the same time. Someone hustled to bring George the news: "Sir, your bitterest enemy is dead. 'Is she, by God!' said the tender husband. ") This disorderly

as such; she was the champion or

\ woman wasn't the enemy of social order ,p

figurehead of a new order against an old -

one. Unattractive as George was,

- a scarecrow

just set up that was ever seen in the

around Westminster Abbey, Caroline

of timing: word of Napoleon's death